"Pieces of the Island"-An English Translation

Normando Hernandez: “We Must Shatter the Chains”

Here’s another excellent article written by Normando Hernandez in which he describes the Castro-government repression and the methods they employ to enslave an entire nation: fear, torture (as is seen in the recent case of Angel Moya), and assassinations (as was the tragic case of Juan Soto Garcia).

We Must Shatter the Chainsby Normando Hernandez, ex prisoner of conscience

Dictatorships are not the only ones that throw chains around freedom. Those who remain silent before the crimes these dictatorships commit are also responsible for enslaving freedom. The hypocrisy exercised by democratic governments and international organizations, such as the UN to name just one of the many, provide a green light to dictatorships when they pretend to be deaf when those who attack freedom asphyxiate an entire people. Let us not forget the phrase we Cubans frequently use: “He who holds the cows leg when it is being slaughtered is just as guilty as he who kills it”.

Until when are democratic governments going to continue playing along with the horrors of the Cuban misgovernment? They can’t talk to me about the free will of people because we all know that Cubans do not have the right to rights. I would also like for someone to explain to me how we can solve a conflict if we do not interfere in it.

I am not ashamed to say that the main culprits of Cuba’s situation are Cubans themselves. It’s true. But it is also true that the government of the Castro brothers has always had an opposition against them ever since day one on January 1st of 1959. And that opposition has been vilified, massacred, executed, jailed, and exiled before the passive stares of the world and the horrified eyes of the Cuban people who see their reflections on the mirror State terrorism which has existed on the island for 52 years. Why can’t efforts be unified to support that opposition so that Cuba can achieve the freedom its people have long awaited?

We know that modern so-called revolutions consist of an organized opposition within the country and support from abroad. In Cuba, the opposition is organized but it does not have the sufficient support to carry out its goals. A perfect example is the sleepiness with which democratic governments have responded towards the State-sponsored assassination of Juan Wilfredo Soto Garcia, the 46 year old dissident who died on May 8th 2011 after Castro policemen beat him and burst his pancreas just for wanting to be a free man and for sitting on a park bench talking about baseball.

And just like that, those international organizations, those governments, and those democrats remain silent while Castro henchmen beat and torture peaceful people simply because they do not agree with the ideology of those who rule in Cuba.

One of the most recent examples of torture was the one the ex-prisoner of conscience from the group of the 75, Angel Moya, was subjected to this past Thursday May 12th. A State Security official who goes by the name of Camilo tortured Moya by pressuring a pillow down on his face, as he tried to asphyxiate him. This method of torture is the same as the one we know as “the submarine” which consists of shoving the prisoners face into a bucket of water to produce a sensation of asphyxiation. The “crime” which Moya committed was that he was trying to meet with a group of dissidents which were going to pay homage to political prisoners which had been assassinated by the Cuban government. Moya was also beat by the political police- those officers which enjoy complete impunity, like the ones who killed Soto Garcia.

Angel Moya, after being beat and tortured

We would not be surprised if tomorrow we receive a new notice that other individuals or groups of dissidents have been detained, beaten, tortured, and/or assassinated because, unfortunately, that’s how things are in Cuba. And I am not playing the role of a prophet here. The problem is that totalitarian governments gain strength from the silence and hypocrisy of those who tolerate them.

We’ve had enough. We must unite our forces and deposit our grains of sand just as was done in favor of the Libyan people. We must shatter the chains which tie down freedom in the most beautiful land which humans have laid eyes upon.